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When I was younger, my friend Allie’s mom always had the loveliest flowers blooming in their house in the middle of winter. When Allie moved back north last winter, she started up the tradition again and had a little spring oasis in her house. So it got me thinking…

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about the laundry room. Not really sure why, but I’m fairly certain I need to do something with it soon to put my mind at ease. It feels like a blank canvas and I am just dieing to smear it with finger paint! Okay, perhaps more like smear it with carefully selected latex paints in a meticulously planned design; but nonetheless, I need to do something.

Its been a while since I last posted. That’s mostly because I’ve been too busy enjoying my holiday downtime to do anything as laborious as opening my laptop. Reading books, baking, decorating, watching the Die Hard series 4.7 times – has been a full-time gig, and it’s be so wonderful! I’m all about ‘stay-cations’ now that we have a home of our own. I never want to leave. I’m not one to get homesick, but after travelling constantly for the past 4 months, I found myself yearning for the quiet of our house. So, I took two weeks off and enjoyed it thoroughly. There’s nothing like just being in your own space and soaking it in.

The time has come when plaster dust is finally a thing of our past. That’s right – the kitchen and living room renovations are done! Well, sorta. The worst is definitely over. There are a couple cabinets we’ve yet to install, some painting on the far wall of the kitchen and a feature wall in the living room (plus the living room layout will turn 90 degrees), and the top of the range hood that still needs going up. But for now, as far as I’m concerned, we’re done!

After having been away for work over the last couple weeks, J has been diligently working on the kitchen and living room renovation to get the walls up and plastered. If you remember the living room earlier there was a half wood-panelled wainscotting wall that I really wanted to get rid of.

After pulling off several of the panels, however, we realized that they weren’t just nailed into place, but also reinforced with industrial glue – so that when pulled off the wall they took half of the drywall with it. Once it was started it was too late to stop (though we’ll be thinking twice before tackling the hallways). We removed it all and then stared at the mess of a wall that was left over. We then had a choice of either trying to plaster over it and take a LOT of time trying to make the wall look smooth again, or tear it out and re-drywall. After having some contractors come and take a look, they strongly recommended we re-drywall, and so it began.

So I realize it’s been a while since I last posted. It seems that tennis elbow isn’t as innocuous an injury as I first thought. It’s actually been extremely, profoundly, annoyingly, and inexplicably painful as well as inconvenient. Unfortunately having a daytime desk job hasn’t increased my recovery rate, if anything it’s been quite the opposite. Although I am now (as a result) an accomplished ambidexter, I’m still fairly incapable of writing a full email without requiring an ice-pack and several pain killers. Hence my delay in posting.

Nonetheless, after taking over 2 months off reno-detail, and with J having amazingly taken over as lead renovator (as well as bag-carrier, dinner-maker, floor-cleaner, and teeth-brusher) in the house, I’m gaining strength and mobility and may even be able to paint the kitchen walls this weekend. Ya, you heard me, those puppies are ready for paint! Now, I’m not about to give it all away today, but wait until you see the drywalling that’s been going on here!). I’ll be following up with the final reno pics of the kitchen in the coming weeks, but for now, you need to get caught up on all the other action, namely the upstairs bath.

It has been quite a week. My last week of ‘vacation’ and I’ve been going 9+ hrs solid each day on the bloody kitchen, but we’re seeing some progress finally.

Let me start by saying, if you are ever contemplating whether to buy new kitchen cabinets or refinish your old ones, think very hard on it before you commit. Because after this week, I’m wishing we just spent the rest of our savings and bought a whole new kitchen. As much as I researched the process for painting kitchen cabinets, I couldn’t have imagined how laborious, tedious, boring, and strenuous the whole process would be.

It’s been a very busy week. We’ve managed to nearly finish the powder room downstairs, but have yet to install the final light fixture – hence I’m holding out on posting any of the after shots. Nonetheless, we’ve made great headway on the kitchen and the upstairs bathroom renovations – which are also missing a few last fixtures before the final shots are posted. I’ll follow up with a post on the kitchen progress soon.